Mon 07/31/17

Tue 05/09/17

In this special event, part of SFI’s 2017 Community Lecture Series, actors present select scenes from Marin Gazzaniga’s play, followed by discussion with cognitive scientist and philosopher Dennett (an SFI external professor) and Michael S. Gazzaniga, a cognitive neuroscientist (and the playwright’s...

Fri 04/14/17

Kearns is a professor in the Computer and Information Science Department at the University of Pennsylvania, where he holds the National Center Chair. He has secondary appointments in the Department of Economics, and in the departments of Statistics and Operations, Information, and Decisions in the Wharton...

Wed 01/25/17

Christof Koch is a physicist turned neurobiologist who is president and chief scientific officer of the Allen Institute for Brain Science in Seattle. His most recent book, Consciousness: Confessions of a Romantic Reductionist, summarizes the modern science of consciousness.

Tue 10/18/16

Math is often thought of as a discipline of certainty and consistency — of black and white, zeroes and ones. But in reality, mathematics is full of uncertainty and contradiction. In this talk, mathematician and author Jordan Ellenberg discusses how this gray area provides us with powerful tools...

Tue 09/27/16

The Information Edge: Creation and Destruction in Life, the Economy, and the Universe
SFI’s popular Ulam Lecture Series -- now in its 24th year – features two talks that explore the Information Edge, the principle underlying both the creation and destruction of our universe’s complex...

Mon 09/26/16

The Information Edge: Creation and Destruction in Life, the Economy, and the Universe
SFI’s popular Ulam Lecture Series -- now in its 24th year – features two talks that explore the Information Edge, the principle underlying both the creation and destruction of our universe’s complex...

Tue 08/30/16

How will our future computers, robots and smartphones get the emotional intelligence they need to be truly useful? This talk highlights the adventures behind some of the world's first technologies that recognize human emotion. Researcher and author Rosalind W. Picard will share surprises from her...

Tue 06/07/16

The language we speak shapes how we experience life, creating a world view based on its vocabulary and grammar…right? Not so, says John McWhorter. Drawing from the scientific literature, McWhorter explains how this widely-held belief is not only false, it leads to dangerous assumptions about cultures...

Tue 04/12/16

It has been more than two years since confirmation of the Ebola hemorrhagic fever outbreak in West Africa. Now, with the end of the outbreak in sight, we have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to learn from the experience. The global impact of that epidemic, and recent outbreaks of SARS and influenza,...

Tue 03/15/16

For nearly half a century, Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been more science fiction than science: exciting, possible, but just out of reach. And despite significant advances, "strong AI" in many ways remains elusive. Best-selling author and entrepreneur Gary Marcus provides a cognitive scientist's...

Mon 02/29/16

Modern humans are building megacities – and networks of megacities – at an unprecedented scale. Annalee Newitz compares today’s urbanization phenonmenon to that of the Neolithic period roughly 9,000 years ago, when humans first began living in sedentary communities. That shift prompted...

Thu 02/04/16

When it comes to human behavior, some traits are neither nature nor nurture, but something altogether different. That “something” is epigenetics, the science that helps to explain how the environment, including some social interactions, alter DNA. In this talk, Dr. Karissa Sanbonmatsu gives...

Wed 11/18/15

What shapes our personalities? How do we account for near-death experiences? How do we make decisions? And what happens when we accept that everything we feel and think stems not from an immaterial spirit but from electrical and chemical activity in our brains? Neurophilosopher Churchland grounds the...

Wed 10/14/15

For decades, science has told us that biology defines gender differences. But what if the scientists – and popular culture – have got it wrong? Fine explores the literature, from studies in scientific journals to the latest assertions of Mars and Venus author John Gray, to challenge society’s attribution...

Wed 09/16/15

2015 Stanislaw Ulam Memorial Lecture Series - The Web of Life and the Ecological Human
Lecture 2
Traditionally, most ecological research has studied ecosystems as separate from humans. In her second lecture, Dunne shows how humans fit into and impact ecosystems through their myriad interactions...

Tue 09/15/15

2015 Stanislaw Ulam Memorial Lecture Series - The Web of Life and the Ecological Human
Lecture 1
Dunne shares surprising findings from her research of food webs, the networks of who eats whom in nature. After revealing hidden ecological order, she explores the underlying forces that constrain...